To Be Or Not To Be, Or What You Will
by PerfectPrefect
Summary: Shakespeare and Harry Potter fans, this is your story! It combines themes from plays such as Hamlet and Twelfth Night, all using Harry Potter characters. R/R! It also uses Shakespearean language! You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll love it!
1. Act I, Scene I

A/N: Due to the Shakespearean language which is used within the dialogue, I will be providing a summery of each scene beforehand so that you guys can follow the text better. Trust me, those really help me in Shakespeare class.

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Act I; Scene I Summery: While spending a week at the Burrow with the Weasley family, Harry tells Ron about how he has seen the spirit of the late Bartimus Crouch SR roaming the halls of the Weasley residence. While investigating this, the two boys are actually approached by the ghost, who says nothing to them. However, when Harry and Ron ask Percy, who has been in mourning for the past seven months over the death of both his boss and Cedric Diggory, about the ghost; Percy says that he too has seen the spector around. Once Harry and Ron exit, Percy expresses in a soliloquy about how he is not mourning for the death of Cedric and Crouch, but for how their death will be the start of the new war against Voldemorte.

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Act I; Scene I

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Enter Harry who is then bumped into by Ron

Harry: What spirit or creature hath chosen to startle me in such a way? Be gone evil demon, for I know you are of no good due to the burning pain in my scar!

Ron: Be not so paranoid, Friend!

Harry: Oh Ron...you must not frighten me so!

Ron: Why speak you of your scar? Hath the Dark Lord risen yet again?

Harry: Nay, methinks it not to be so.

Ron: Then why dost thou speak in such fear?

Harry: 'Tis a spirit, the one in the form of the late Bartimus Crouch SR, that I hath seen wandering the halls of this house!

Ron: Speak not with madness, Harry! My brother's boss did pass over seven months ago, as did Cedric Diggory. Percy still wears nothing but black and walks to the sound of melancholy minstrels. A spector such as that of Crouch would not appear within our house, as one would think he nothing but the product of Percy's declining sanity.

Harry: Be so what you say, Ron. But mine eyes hath seen a spirit of that very form!

_(Enter Ghost)_

Ron: By my wand, I too see it!

Harry: Same form as which I hath spoken. _(To Ghost)_ What be your reason?

Ron: Yes, Spirit, do speak to us.

_{Exit Ghost)_

Harry: 'Tis but our folly. Say, perchance it hath spoken to Percy.

Ron: If Percy hath spoken to it.

Harry: He speaks not? For part of his mourning?

Ron: Nay, he does speak, but nothing but cries and whimpers like that of a dove which hath entangled itself in a wire. 

Harry: So then he speaks?

Ron: Nay Friend, he whines.

Harry: Whining is speaking, though.

Ron: _You _would say such.

_(Enter Percy)_

Ron: Here comes our Melancholy Minister now. How now, Percy?

Percy: Speak not of day while in mourning. Dost thou not have any respect for those who have passed?

Ron: Nay, Dear Brother, for no need to dwell on the passed while in the present.

Percy: Be silent for those who are passed will always be present while their services to the earth are not yet done. Both men died before their time, murdered by a dark one's hand or spoken curse. The curse is not theirs, for those who curse are themselves the damned. Damned to live forever in Limbo while those which to whose life they hath brought end, forever haunt their dreams as well as eyes with the moans heard seconds before their death.

Harry: Aye, you have seen the spirit too, then?

Percy: I shall not speak as the spirit shall not speak to you. For as long as I wear these colours of night, do the dead still live. That is why he hath spoken to me and has muttered not a word to you. For all he is to you is nothing but a flickering memory, and by that to you he shall appear. Yet to me he lives as he did throughout his years...and thus that way to me he shall be seen.

Ron: Utter madness!

__

(Exit Ron and Harry)

Percy: He speaks so much yet says nothing.

For I do not mourn for the two men alone, 

Yet for the lives which we call our own.

Did not they see the thing which caused their demise

Is the same thing which will bring our society's end before

their very eyes.

So I do not cry for the death of a friend'

But for the fact that our civilisation shall soon too

meet by Death Eaters it's end.


	2. Act I, Scene II

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Act I; Scene II Summery: At a Quidditch field in Hogsmeade, Fred, George, Angelina, and Oliver meet for a practise. While this is going on, Fred and George ask Oliver, who is Percy's best friend, if he knows what has been wrong with their brother. Oliver replies that he is not sure, but that Percy has seemed to have lost interest in everything, including his girlfriend, Penelope Clearwater. While practise is going on, Marcus Flint then approaches and proceeds to act superior towards the four.

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Act I; Scene II

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Enter Fred, George, and Angelina

Fred: 'Tis but a fine morning for a Quidditch practise! The sun is high and the sky is clear.

George: Aye, but I cannot seem to fly straight today.

Angelina: Aye knave, for you are more drunken than a, Irish man on St. Patrick's holiday!

George: But I am of Irish blood.

Angelina: So be it, fool! Perchance that is why you haven't a lady...

Fred: Nor have I...

Angelina: Being twins you are but both the same!

George: Aye, 'tis no folly to be a fool!

Angelina: Which is exactly why I still laugh at your un-thought mockeries, boy!

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( Enter Oliver)

Fred: Hark! Here is our captain! Good day, Oliver!

Oliver: Alas fools, tell me that I have not walked in on yet another example of Gryffindor knavery. As we exemplify the brave we are to act as so, and thus not be made cowards by the consumption of alcohol.

George: Good Captain, why would me drunk our name in such a way by being mocked?

Angelina: See how the fools doth speak?

Oliver: Aye,wench. Though you shalt not mock as you are no higher than he who speaks in slurred tongue.

Angelina: So high art thou to let such slander be respected, Captain. You speak as if you were Percy.

Oliver: Aye me...such a sad sort is he. So drawn away from the light, from life. Only over seven months hath he been so lost. Once he smiled, drunk, and laughed...but no more. He hath turned mourning into night by casting out the day.

Fred: What speak you of his 'day'?

Oliver: She hath skin of ivory that yearns for a warm man's touch

Lips of crimson with which she begs to be kissed so tenderly.

Aye, but none of which she can have, as he hath been so consumed

With his breaking heart that he must break hers' all the same.

So sweet 'tis the lady fair, with her golden curls and 

Possession of innocence which mimics that of Madonna

Along with keen wisdom which could make Athene envy she.

Yet such a man as he push the dove aside, after he hath sworn to her

His immortal love.

One would assume that a lady as wise as she would push him out of her heart,

But nay, like her namesake, Penelope waits for Odysseus to return though

Twenty years lost in the sea of his misery.

George: Art thou saying that thou could die within the eyes of my brother's lady?

Oliver: Nay Good Fool, I shalt not think of such a divine creature in any way that could mar her.

Angelina: One would assume the Captain would go after such a lady, even if she were the mistress of his dearest friend.

Oliver: I speak with no desire for anything more than her happiness!

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(Enter Marcus Flint)

Marcus: How now, Curs. What brings you to this field which I hath claimed as mine own?

Oliver: 'Tis the field of the State, not of one single man.

Marcus: Silence, Oliver, or I shalt draw my wand.

Oliver: Thou art too hot headed and proud, Marcus. All thou must do is ask and thou shalt have the field as we will willingly share.

Marcus: Proud? Thou hath called me proud?

Oliver: Aye, and I see that thou art not proud to be named proud!

Marcus: Nay! Thus I shalt draw my wand and mutter a deadly curse which shall then kill you.

George: Alas, the wise man speaks the truth!

Marcus: Oliver...I have had enough! Take the fool away!

George: Captain, you hear the man, take Marcus away!

Marcus: Do not tempt me fool!

George: Tempt you with what? The quivering thigh of a lady fair, or in your case perhaps that of a _man _fair!

Marcus: Thou art a fool!

George: Why so? Because I make jest at your aching bones?

Marcus: Speak no more, Cur!

Oliver: Peace, George, peace!

George: Peace?! Hah! I shalt give Marcus a piece!

Marcus: Silence you all, Knaves. I wish not to share a common place with those who speak in jest.

__

(exit Marcus)

Oliver: _(to George)_ Sometimes a fool as yourself could be wiser than a scholar. Come along team, let us begin our practise.


	3. Act I, Scene III

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Act I; Scene III Summery: While alone in her home, Penelope reflects on her declining relationship with Percy as well as her role as a woman in society. Once through with her soliloquy, Fred and George enter and resume to entertain Penelope by singing a rather enjoyable, yet appropriate song. While they are singing, Percy enters and he and Penelope get into an argument about the importance of love and Percy makes a mockery of woman -kind. Yet even so, Penelope states in an aside at the end of the scene that she still loves Percy for who he was before he was driven mad by whatever forces.

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Act I; Scene II

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(Enter Penelope)

Penelope: Aye me, 'twas not so long ago when I though us to live a dream.

One hand, one heart, one soul were we. I was but a fool to

Believe that man hath sworn the truth to woman.

Man never hath spoken true to woman, yet just 

Wooed with words that bee-stung lips lap up like honey.

Aye, yet Jove would laugh at woman's folly,

Being how it were just merely punishment of the original sin.

Being of the weaker sex, I know so well how this sin might be

Seeming as if I myself were Eve.

As God punishes I, as does Cupid, stabbing me with his golden arrow.

Oh fickle son of Aphrodite, do use thine lead-tipped arrow

To quench me from this unrequited state!

Women are but the wand of men,

There to cast magic but can so easily be replaced when

It no longer suits he.

Oh, though I not yet used, my cedar wood is yet needing a polish,

But still in the hands of a man who uses me not in charm,

But in curse.

Oh sweet curse! Why do I wait for thee so?

Perchance my tears hath such relation to the salt in the sea

That I still feel that part of myself is always with thee!

__

(Enter Fred and George)

Fred: What causes our Lady to weep thus?

Penelope: 'Tis nothing that thou can tend.

George: Be it over our brother?

Penelope: Good fool, I prithee thee to let well enough alone.

Fred: But if thou do weep, then it is the job of the fools to ease her tears.

George: Shall we sing for thee?

Fred: A merry tune! Complete with a _Hey Nonny Nonny!_

Penelope: Aye, if it will make thou silent, then do sing!

Fred: _(sings)_

" Sigh no more ladies, 

Sigh no more! 

Sigh no more, no more!

Men were deceivers ever!

One foot in sea..."

George: _(sings)_

"One foot in sea..."

Fred:_ (sings)_

"And one on shore..."

George: _(sings)_

"And one on shore..."

Fred: _(sings)_

"Converting songs of woe

Into 

Hey nonny nonny!

Hey nonny nonny!"

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(Enter Percy)

Penelope: How now, Good Sir!

Percy: Speak low with your light tone, Madam. Thou hast not the power of which to derive me from my misery.

Penelope: I never attempted to make the heavy light, for I am not like one of the fools.

George: If happiness be the feast of fools, then clothe me in patched garments!

Percy: Silence, brother. You amuse me not. I beg of you two fools, be gone. I wish a word alone with the lady.

Fred: Aye, Grave man, we leave you to your tomb.

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(Exit Fred and George)

Penelope: What do you wish to speak of, my Lord?

Percy: I wish to speak of love.

Penelope: Thou may speakest of love if thou acts of it as well.

Percy: I speak not of our love, Dear Lady, but of the love that which we bare our civilisation. The love of which we bare Hogsmeade.

Penelope: Yet by not speaking of our love, you are speaking of it just the same. Thou hath cast it aside as if it were the waves to an oar. If you act not of our love for each other, than I shalt not wait on it much longer. So happy we were once...

Percy: So happy before I hath seen the spirit of the man so seven months passed!

Penelope: We have all seen such spirit!

Percy: Yet you pay no mind to it! I thought you wise once, Penelope, now mine eyes see that thou art just as fickle as any other wench!

Penelope: Speak not to me in such manner, Good Sir! If thou dost love me...

Percy: I do love, thee, Woman! I just haven't the time for the madness which we men call love.

Penelope: Thou has not the time for anything that can not lead you to be Minister.

Percy: Be not saucy, Maiden.

Penelope: At least I hath not cast off my maiden head to thou!

Percy: Ah... so to some other rouge, then. I should have thought as much....

Penelope: Do my ears deceive me?

Percy: Silence, Wanton maid! Get thee to a nunnery before thou dost tender the fool of a fool!

(_Exit Percy)_

Penelope: He speaks with the madness of Ares fire, yet still mine eyes doth see only the love that once I had bared he!

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	4. Act I, Scene IV

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Act I; Scene IV Summery: While having a time of revelry out in the Quidditch Pitch, Fred, George, and Angelina are approached by Marcus Flint who continues to act superior to them. After Marcus exits, Angelina come up with a plot to make Marcus seem like a fool: She will forge a letter from Penelope to make it seem as if Penelope is in love with him. After reading it, Angelina assumes that Marcus would then go and make a fool out of himself in front of the girl whom so many men in Hogsmeade have courted.

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Act I; Scene IV

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(Enter Fred and George)

George: If rum be the drink of the liver, then let it be my livery!

Fred: By my troth, thou hath offended even the Fool! Say, where is our Captain?

George: This time of night, a captain oft lie in his bed. Our captain but alone, muttering sweet moans of "Penelope!" in such a way to cause him to drown within his sheets!

Fred: Alas, Oliver still doth woo the damsel of our brother's fancy?

George: He hath never wooed her, but more just given heartfelt sighs whenever he name 'twas mentioned. See not however he spakes of her soft lips, her glowing eyes, and her smooth thighs which but....

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(Enter Angelina)

Angelina: How now, good twins. I doth have heard George's lustrous commentaries about our captain. I say with utmost regret, Sir George, that our captain dost not think of thou as he thinks of thine Lady Penelope.

George: Spite you, woman! How dare thou make such awful conclusions as to me being able to die within the eyes of our captain! Bonny wench!

Angelina: 'Tis but your folly, drunkard. Being how we cannot practise without our captain, do entertain us with a song and dance, Sir Fred.

Fred: I would not be the Fool of man, if I did not fool men and women alike! A drinking song, perhaps?

George: I have the rum!

Fred: Aye, good brother! And I have the voice!

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(sings)

"O mistress mine where are you roaming?

O, stay and hear! your true love's coming,

That can sing both high and low;

High and low!

Trip no further, pretty sweeting;

Journey ends in lovers' meeting ;

Every wise man's son doth know!

What is love? 'Tis not hereafter;

Present mirth hath present laughter;

What's to come is still unsure;

Still unsure!

In delay there lies no plenty;

Then come kiss me sweet and twenty,

Youth's a stuff will not endure!"

George: Such a good song goes with such a good drink!

Angelina: 'Tis but a happy night! Though I know not why!

Fred: For we are but alive, be that not happy enough?

_(Enter Marcus)_

Marcus: Such a racket at this hour? Is it not too late for you fools three to be awake?

George: Nay for 'too late' hath passed three hours ago, and it is now 'too early' to be asleep.

Marcus: Sir George, the Lady bade me that I shalt speak to you about how your drunken madness hath frenzied the Court. She said that thou would gain more respect if thou were to act as if he were from the noble family to which he was born, instead of a kitchen knave.

Fred: Are you not out of your league, Servant of the Lady? Thou art nothing more than a well-dressed squib! If your well cleansed clothes were to be dirtied, than you would be no higher than Filch; therefore you cannot speak to two noble men in such tongue!

Marcus: I bid you adieu, fools three, as I wish not to be stricken with your ignorance.

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(Exit Marcus)

Angelina: Ignorant squib! Thinking himself higher than those with higher title!

So self-absorbed is this man that he think that every creature which

Lay eyes upon him doth love him!

He speaks with a sort of mock intelligent tongue which only makes him

Seem all the more a fool.

Fred: What say you we do about this knave, then?

Angelina: Make him aware of his stature through humiliation.

Fred: How so?

Angelina: Mine penmanship is close to that of the Lady Penelope, as we all can see from this letter which I hold here in my hands. With the exception of my "P" and my "Q", we are nearly one for one. Perhaps the greatest letter the same are "M", "A", "U", and "C". All of which are in the name Marcus!

George: Quit your banter, woman, what be your plan?

Angelina: Do you see it not? I shall write a fake letter of love, addressing it from the lady, Marcus shall have it sent to him by owl post, thus he would think that he is the object of the Lady's desire!

Fred: By my wand it is genius!

Angelina: Then he shall approach the lady, expecting her to love but instead she shall laugh for it shall be stated within the letter that he shall come dressed in a yellow cape over brown breeches, and yellow knee socks! How the Lady hates the colour yellow, as she calls it "the colour of the liver!"

George: _(Looks away, as he is dressed in yellow)_

Fred: So it shall be! A stage for humour, mockery, and karma entwined!

__ __


	5. Act I, Scene V

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Act I; Scene V, Summery: After leaving Penelope's house, Percy and Oliver are visited by the Ghost. It signals to Percy. Oliver tries to stop him from following the ghost, but Percy will not be held back.

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Act I; Scene V

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(Enter Percy and Oliver)

Oliver: The air bites shrewdly, a bitter cold chills my bones leaving in eerie sensation upon my spine.

Percy: Of what hour is it, friend?

Oliver: It has just struck of twelve.

Percy: Perchance then that is what draw such a chill this eve or morn. For it is not the air that chills, but the spirit which lurks this hour.

Oliver: Good heart, were you out to see thine lady or to relish in a few drinks?

Percy: I went to see her, but she doth think me mad. Foolish sex art she! A lady who hath never mourned cannot judge one on their mourning.

Oliver: Alas, you know not much of she whom you claim as your own. She hath mourned for her brother who is seven months lost a sea. Laertes, a good, noble captain of Ithaca...born just an hour before your lady. Yet, she finds not so much a need for constant grief, as there is no sense to mourn for a soul which is in Heaven.

Percy: Art thou saying that Sir Crouch is in Hell?

Oliver: Nay, for he is in purgatory...

Percy: Why say you that?

Oliver: For over there is his spector which has not as of yet spoken a word!

__

Enter Ghost

Percy: Alas...he doth come again.

Yet to speak no words to you, as you too think him dead.

Can you not see that his soul is not at rest if he still wanders this earth?

Dressed is he in the very same garments in which he was said to hath

Worn on the very day in which he did sentence his own son to Azkaban.

Men often don for eternity the apparel which they hath worn on the

Day of their most notable contribution to the Earth. He was a traitor.

A traitor for the wise. Some might claim him to be a criminal...a 

Judas to his own family, yet in mine eyes he was a saint.

One gets to Heaven when doing for another without once thinking

of themselves. Crouch new that although to turn in his own son

Was wrong to the rest, it was what God had told him to do.

God sent down a messenger to him, which spoke of

Eternal greatness for avenging the wrath of Voldemort.

__

(The Ghost beckons)

Oliver: He beckons you to go forth.

Percy: So I shall follow.

Oliver: Nay... thou must not. You know not if he hath put up the guise like a bogart, but instead of fear, he begs you hither with familiarity. What to say if thou should follow, that the spirit shall not lead you to your death or to madness? Perhaps he is such a hideous creature; that behind the facade, his true form will render you mindless. Do not go forth...I heed you hear my, dear friend!

Percy: You speak with such I fear, I would think you a Hufflepuff! He begs me follow, and I shall do thus.

_(Exit Ghost and Percy)_


End file.
